DoF - Elephant in the room?

[1973 ranger]

Agreed needs to be moved on.

[Tarbie]

Sir Les is a true club legend. Would be such a shame to have that memory tarnished. What are your views on his position, now that JFH is gone?

Given his track record of our last two managerial appointments, do you still trust him in this vital role of overseeing the next one? The last two appointments have been disastrous, so getting the next one right becomes even more crucial.

Plenty of threads here on who people want as the next manager, but surely this is the more relevant question?

How many more failed managerial appointments can he be trusted with? (Or the even bigger question - is having a DoF in the first place a hindrance for a club of our size?)

Many on here no longer seem to trust him (hence this thread). Others still seem to have faith...

2 managerial appointments that really haven't been good at all. Very 50/50 in the transfer market, although admittedly he's operating on a very small budget. Personally I'm starting to lose patience!

[HammersmithR]

So Les Ferdinand's 2 appointments of Ramsey and Hasselbank...

have been an utter disaster. I wonder what the board are thinking of their 'footballing' man?

We are back to square one again. We are just such a joke of a club. From one disaster to another.

[Rebel R's]

If he appoints a sacked league 1 manager or brings back Holloway then it really proves the point about how clueless he is,why the board allow him pick managers is beyond me

[1973 ranger]

Totally agree we have not progressed One bit since the takeover in 2011.

[maidstone_hoop]

I think TF will drive this appointment personally!

[skranger]

loved Les as a player but for me DOF is a non job , just bring in an experienced strong manager and the whole role of DOF is redundant . Sorry Les but its time to go.

Also with LF still in place the managerial choice will be tainted ...

[spiderman]

The reason the club is going backwards is because we are not appointing managers/coaches based on merit. Fernandes started it by employing his mate Ferdinand with zero managerial experience, in a DOF roll which is totally unnecessary and makes it hard for any manager to do their job properly.Since then Ferdinand has totally abused his position by bringing in Ramsey, JFH, Andy Impy, Paul Furlong and Paul Hall. All mates and none of them deserved the positions they were given. We need a total clearout, and get Pearson or Fat Sam in to rebuild the club.

[TBLOCKRANGER]

I think some folks have very short memories.
Prior to Sir Les arrival the club was besieged by mercanaries on massive long contracts, internal splits within the camp, ill-discipline and most importantly a huge chasm between board and management. The latter was a major concern for most posters on here who consistently said the managers were pulling down the boards pants and squandering our money without any tangible results.
The whole purpose of a DOF was to limit expenditure and make sure the club wasnt ripped off again by agents etc and survived within its means (for a club that gets in 15k) our means are not being Chelsea as some would desire.
On the basis that the DOF has worked within that remit of limited spending and making sure the Board aren't ripped off then surely SLF has achieved his rather undesirable aims, he came in to steady the (sinking) ship not to find Aztec Gold as some desire.
What's gone wrong is the success of the managers under SLF tenure being Ramsey who wasnt great nor was JFH but they did no better or worse than a well established prem manager (sparky) or a once potential England manager (Arry) who both had far more resources through no fault of SLF.
Only critiscm that can be levelled against SLF were whether the two that were appointed by him, which no one has any evidence to say whether that is the case, they might have been nominated by him but a board interviewed em but in any event on the face of it with the club in such terrible financial crisis the two management signings weren't that bizarre but they didnt succeed so let's move on.
What is my concern is save for NW in 2011 and resurfaced in his 2nd coming is that we as a club for about 20 years have generally been eh. "Rubbish" ..it's clearly an institutional rubbish as we occassionally sign good players and they play for us they are rubbish they then move on and become good. The club for whatever reason is finding it hard to evolve and that as some had said (Wina, Superhoop nik & malta) above it is going to be hard to fix by say one man coming in as manager and suddenly transforming everything ver night, 6 months, a year even 3.
I think we needed a change of manager purely as I couldn't sleep on Saturday nights as my nap between 3.00 tp 4.45pm messed things up but I think we need SLF in place for any long term project to stabilise us and avoid the mistakes of the past.

[hal9thou]

The reason the club is going backwards is because we are not appointing managers/coaches based on merit..

exactly.

[Tarbie]

I think some folks have very short memories.
Prior to Sir Les arrival the club was besieged by mercanaries on massive long contracts, internal splits within the camp, ill-discipline and most importantly a huge chasm between board and management. The latter was a major concern for most posters on here who consistently said the managers were pulling down the boards pants and squandering our money without any tangible results.
The whole purpose of a DOF was to limit expenditure and make sure the club wasnt ripped off again by agents etc and survived within its means (for a club that gets in 15k) our means are not being Chelsea as some would desire.
On the basis that the DOF has worked within that remit of limited spending and making sure the Board aren't ripped off then surely SLF has achieved his rather undesirable aims, he came in to steady the (sinking) ship not to find Aztec Gold as some desire.
What's gone wrong is the success of the managers under SLF tenure being Ramsey who wasnt great nor was JFH but they did no better or worse than a well established prem manager (sparky) or a once potential England manager (Arry) who both had far more resources through no fault of SLF.
Only critiscm that can be levelled against SLF were whether the two that were appointed by him, which no one has any evidence to say whether that is the case, they might have been nominated by him but a board interviewed em but in any event on the face of it with the club in such terrible financial crisis the two management signings weren't that bizarre but they didnt succeed so let's move on.
What is my concern is save for NW in 2011 and resurfaced in his 2nd coming is that we as a club for about 20 years have generally been eh. "Rubbish" ..it's clearly an institutional rubbish as we occassionally sign good players and they play for us they are rubbish they then move on and become good. The club for whatever reason is finding it hard to evolve and that as some had said (Wina, Superhoop nik & malta) above it is going to be hard to fix by say one man coming in as manager and suddenly transforming everything ver night, 6 months, a year even 3.
I think we needed a change of manager purely as I couldn't sleep on Saturday nights as my nap between 3.00 tp 4.45pm messed things up but I think we need SLF in place for any long term project to stabilise us and avoid the mistakes of the past.

Don't disagree with any of that but surely now with Lee Hoos in place as CEO and the club is under far better financial control than the early days with Phil Beard, with a better Manager in place Les's role could be considered redundant?

Surely if we picked somebody like Warburton, who has experience both in the DOF and the Head Coach role and also has a decent business brain on him, we could dispense of Les too?

I fully understand why we went down the DOF role after the amount of money wasted by Hughes and Redknapp but we've learned from that, Les has played his part in steadying the ship and the club has learned some lesson. You'd struggle to argue that Les' stint with the club had been a success though. Whilst the Profit & Loss no doubt reads a little better, the football has been dire and the club has been steadily moving backwards in terms of league position!

[corbray]

Much rather be in the off the field situation we're in now rather than when we had the likes of park, samba and bosingwa etc

[1973 ranger]

A lot is made on this board about money spent by Hughes and Redknapp in particular but who sanctioned the signings? Ferdinand has come in and arguably was responsible for us getting relegated by appointing his Tottenham chum Ramsay and then he was the driving force behind the last manager due to his own agenda as that bloke was not the best man on the market at that time. He then sold the crown jewels (Audtin) for peanuts a situation that should never happened as that man should have got an improved deal at Wembley instead of wasting it on Troare and Green. We are bang average at best and a million miles away from being a well run club and competitive team on the pitch and when you consider the owners have had 5 years and spunked more money than we could imagine over that time. The whole club needs a overhaul from chairman to manager and now is the time to do it.

[TimPR78]

I think some folks have very short memories.
Prior to Sir Les arrival the club was besieged by mercanaries on massive long contracts, internal splits within the camp, ill-discipline and most importantly a huge chasm between board and management. The latter was a major concern for most posters on here who consistently said the managers were pulling down the boards pants and squandering our money without any tangible results.
The whole purpose of a DOF was to limit expenditure and make sure the club wasnt ripped off again by agents etc and survived within its means (for a club that gets in 15k) our means are not being Chelsea as some would desire.
On the basis that the DOF has worked within that remit of limited spending and making sure the Board aren't ripped off then surely SLF has achieved his rather undesirable aims, he came in to steady the (sinking) ship not to find Aztec Gold as some desire.
What's gone wrong is the success of the managers under SLF tenure being Ramsey who wasnt great nor was JFH but they did no better or worse than a well established prem manager (sparky) or a once potential England manager (Arry) who both had far more resources through no fault of SLF.
Only critiscm that can be levelled against SLF were whether the two that were appointed by him, which no one has any evidence to say whether that is the case, they might have been nominated by him but a board interviewed em but in any event on the face of it with the club in such terrible financial crisis the two management signings weren't that bizarre but they didnt succeed so let's move on.
What is my concern is save for NW in 2011 and resurfaced in his 2nd coming is that we as a club for about 20 years have generally been eh. "Rubbish" ..it's clearly an institutional rubbish as we occassionally sign good players and they play for us they are rubbish they then move on and become good. The club for whatever reason is finding it hard to evolve and that as some had said (Wina, Superhoop nik & malta) above it is going to be hard to fix by say one man coming in as manager and suddenly transforming everything ver night, 6 months, a year even 3.
I think we needed a change of manager purely as I couldn't sleep on Saturday nights as my nap between 3.00 tp 4.45pm messed things up but I think we need SLF in place for any long term project to stabilise us and avoid the mistakes of the past.

Top post! Just hope whoever gets appointed gets some time and we have a bit of stability rather than being hounded out from day one, surely that's not too much to ask :P

[TBLOCKRANGER]

A lot is made on this board about money spent by Hughes and Redknapp in particular but who sanctioned the signings? Ferdinand has come in and arguably was responsible for us getting relegated by appointing his Tottenham chum Ramsay and then he was the driving force behind the last manager due to his own agenda as that bloke was not the best man on the market at that time. He then sold the crown jewels (Audtin) for peanuts a situation that should never happened as that man should have got an improved deal at Wembley instead of wasting it on Troare and Green. We are bang average at best and a million miles away from being a well run club and competitive team on the pitch and when you consider the owners have had 5 years and spunked more money than we could imagine over that time. The whole club needs a overhaul from chairman to manager and now is the time to do it.

I think we would have been relegated even if PG with conte took over from Arry, we were like a sick animal that needed putting down for its own welfare. The MH and Arry era had riddled us with disease that was fatal ...can blame Ramsey for a number of things taking us down isn't one. Again we must not forget how bad we were in the premiership.
As to Austin I agree a new deal but CA is bright, gifted and ambitious no way would he of wanted to stay...if he had given him an improved contract and he was then on his toes then imagine the fall out. He respected the club and we respected him which I accept is odd in football but I'm pleased how we handled him and him being honest with us (as much as he could be in the circumstances) could /should of got more but mkt price etc ...
As to root + branch change to the club I agree but it ain't gonna happen as we live in an immediate success society. We are getting rid of managers so only stability on the ground is SLF and I just don't think the critiscm of him is warranted as the clubs been in such a bad place for so long and how fans turn on proper legends so quickly without any good reason whether it be Marsh or SLF is beyond me. Those two gave us so much and unless they say something like QPR should become Chelsea s B team I'm not gonna have a go at them.
real